Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement

       Judge George Bundy Smith

                               by

                   Bryant E. Pryor 

           CGG 160 Philosophy of Racism 2001           

Several things pushed George Smith closer to becoming an active in the civil struggle”.  One of the first things to happen was the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in 1954 declaring that segregated schools in America was unconstitutional .

 It was against this backdrop that on May 24, 1961 Mr. Smith with four other students and instructor from Wesleyan and Yale boarded a bus to Montgomery Alabama.  "When we arrived in Montgomery we were greeted by a very hostel mob.  The National Guard had to protect us."  After arriving at the bus station they decided to have a cup of coffee and before the coffee arrived, himself and ten others were arrested.  In jail they would discuss strategies for effective nonviolent protests.

Mr. Smith would later discuss sit-in and rally strategies over dinner with Martin Luther King, Jr., Wyatt T. Walker and Ralph Abernathy.   It was no surprise that in 1959 George entered into Yale Law School becoming the only blacks his class.  One of Mr. Smith’s first jobs as a lawyer was with the NAACP defending protesters arrested for sitting-in at segregated lunch counters in Georgia.  On September 24, 1992 Governor Mario M. Cuomo appointed him to the Court of Appeals in New York City.  Judge Smith and his wife, Alene, have two children